PneumoWave raises £7.5 million Series A to accelerate clinical validation and regulatory submission of respiratory change diagnosis and monitoring platform
- £5.2 m equity from Scottish National Investment Bank alongside £2.3 m from existing investors Scottish Enterprise, IIG, London & Scottish Investment Partners, Equity Gap, and Alba Equity
- Boston based life science investor Mark Bamforth of Thairm Bio also joins round ahead of US expansion
- Company aiming to reduce the devastating socioeconomic impact of drug overdose, now the leading cause of accidental death in most developed countries.
- Wearable biosensor alerts carers and emergency medical services
Digital health company PneumoWave announced the closing of £7.5 m Series A financing which will enable clinical validation and regulatory submission of its biosensor technology platform for remote wireless diagnosing and monitoring potentially fatal respiratory changes in high-risk patient groups. The round comprises £5.2 million equity from new investors Scottish National Investment Bank, alongside £2.3 million from existing investors Scottish Enterprise, IIG, Equity Gap, Alba Equity and London and Scottish Investment Partners. Boston based life science investor Mark Bamforth of Thairm Bio also joined the round as PneumoWave prepares to ramp up its US operations. PneumoWave’s technology is being developed as part of an international research program in collaboration with the University of Dundee, University of Glasgow, King’s College London, and NRCH and Department of Health in Victoria, Australia.
“We are delighted to close this round and thank both our existing investors and the Scottish National Investment Bank for their support,” says PneumoWave co-founder and CEO, Dr Bruce Henderson. “Working with leading international centres, we will now be able to accelerate our clinical validation leading to a planned regulatory submission in early 2024. We believe our platform will provide an invaluable tool for increasing the effectiveness of opioid use disorder treatment programmes as well as respiratory disorders in general. In addition, as a consequence of this investment, the company is moving to larger premises here at Eurocentral and will increase the team size from 18 to around 35, including a number of staff in the US.”
RELATED: Respiratory care startup Telesair raises $22M and more digital health fundings
Paul Callaghan, Director Innovation, at the Scottish National Investment Bank adds:
“The Bank’s support for PneumoWave will help their aim of being able to remotely diagnose and monitor high-risk patients with respiratory conditions. This commercial investment has the potential to positively impact significant public health issues in this country and beyond.”
Kerry Sharp, Director, Entrepreneurship and Investment, Scottish Enterprise comments: “Supporting fast growing, innovative companies is a fundamental priority for Scottish Enterprise, and PneumoWave are a fantastic example of how Scotland’s supportive ecosystem can help ambitious early stage companies. This investment builds on early-stage investment support received from a number of investors, including Scottish Enterprise, and will enable Pneumowave to continue with their impressive development and company growth.”
“We are hugely impressed by PneumoWave and what Dr Bruce Henderson and the team have built,” says Robert Naylor, CEO, Intuitive Investments Group. “We strongly believe healthcare providers will adopt PneumoWave’s integrated platform of patient data capture and proprietary analysis, which will transform the way patients with respiratory conditions manage their health and live their lives. The funding round with high quality investors, given market conditions, is testament to the quality of PenumoWave’s business.”
“Equity Gap investors are delighted to continue our support of Pneumowave in conjunction with SNIB investment participation for the first time,” adds Fraser Lusty, Director. “PneumoWave are scaling up their commercial deployment significantly in 2023 and their market leading proprietary technology and data capture will increase efficiency and reduce data burden for clinicians.”
Mark Bamforth of Thairm Bio concludes “This is a great opportunity to support the PneumoWave team to bring their platform to the US to help deliver more effective treatment programmes for both opioid use and general respiratory disorders.”
PneumoWave was advised throughout by Ascendant Corporate Finance and DCS Legal.
Notes to editors:
About PneumoWave:
PneumoWave is a development stage digital health company based in Scotland and the US. The company’s proprietary digital technology provides real-time physiological data and patient-centric digital biomarkers with the core focus of preventing deaths and reducing hospital admissions from respiratory causes. Performance characteristics are not yet established. www.pneumowave.com
About Scottish National Investment Bank
The Scottish National Investment Bank was launched in November 2020 to be a development investment bank for Scotland, delivering patient, mission impact investment to the Scottish economy. The Bank provides long term capital to businesses and projects throughout Scotland to support the development of a fairer, more sustainable economy. The Bank has an ambition to not only invest its allocated public capital, but to encourage additional private capital to invest alongside it, to support the delivery of the missions. www.thebank.scot
About Scottish Enterprise
Scottish Enterprise (SE) is Scotland’s national economic development agency and a non-departmental public body of the Scottish Government. It supports businesses to innovate and scale to transform the Scottish economy by focusing on new market opportunities through targeted investment, innovation and internationalisation. Follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.
About IIG
IIG seeks to provide investors with exposure to a portfolio of investments concentrating on fast growing and/or high potential life sciences businesses operating predominantly in the UK, continental Europe and the US. www.iigplc.co.uk
About Equity Gap Investors
Equity Gap investors is an Edinburgh based angel investment syndicate, established to help match investors with entrepreneurs looking for early stage business funding. Equity Gap members currently invest in over 30 companies, leveraging over £70m in total investment into this portfolio. Equity Gap investee companies have created over 400 jobs, primarily in Scotland, across a range of sectors including consumer product, food and drink, life science and SaaS. www.equitygap.co.uk
About Alba Equity
Alba Equity is an investment syndicate based in Aberdeen which makes investments into businesses with high growth potential. As well as providing capital Alba seeks to add significant value by leveraging the experience, time and connections of its members to assist in the ongoing development of the business. www.albaequity.com
About London & Scottish Investment Partners
Founded in 2014, London & Scottish Investment Partners is an angel group based in Edinburgh, United Kingdom. The firm prefers to invest in UK life sciences, technology, oil & gas, food and drink, and manufacturing sectors. www.lsip.co.uk
Follow the latest news on Guided Solutions
